Octave 9

2018ROLE: CREATIVE DIRECTION, DESIGN

It was an honor to be selected to work on the Seattle Symphony’s flagship experiential endeavor: Octave 9. As the Symphony would state it, “Octave 9 stretches the boundaries of creative possibility, immersing you in new worlds through the fusion of music and technology.”

I took that evocative thesis to heart when tasked with creating the Logo for the new space, which will look to be complete and open to the public later in 2018. The brand colors reflect the Seattle Symphony’s history, while the looping “O” and “9” form an impossible loop.

If Octave 9 wasn’t news enough, the Seattle Symphony was named Orchestra of the Year at the 2018 Gramophone Classical Music Awards. They are often viewed as equivalent to or surpassing the American Grammy award, and referred to as the Oscars for classical music (at least according to Wikipedia).

Golden State Warriors - Golden Guardians

When the globally-successful League of Legends decided to expand their North American esports league, the NBA Champion Golden State Warriors wasted no time in locking down a new team – The Golden Guardians. They needed a brand to reflect the dynastic Warriors legacy, with a nod to the future of competitive sports.

The logo is designed around two key elements: The Spear and The Bridge. The Spear for the Guardian, and the Bridge for, well, the Bay Bridge. The bridge is portrayed in profile within the Warriors current logo, but in the Guardians mark, the bridge takes on a first-person point of view – as if one was experiencing the drive across the iconic structure. By showcasing the Bay Bridge from this proactive vantage point, the viewer is presented with a new dimension of a familiar brand.

Esports are a growing part of the multi-billion dollar gaming industry, and the Global Games Market has nearly double the annual revenue of the global music industry and annual box office receipts combined.

Microsoft Envisioning: Pedestal

2013ROLE: CREATIVE DIRECTION, USER EXPERIENCE, DESIGN

Collaborating with Microsoft’s Strategic Prototyping team, I created a “space-plankton” look-and-feel, based on phosphorescence—the magical, natural wonder that makes the sea glow when tiny plankton are disrupted. This was the core of the navigation system for purchasing a toy, whose features could be explored on a touch-enabled tabletop display. When a customer sets an item on the Pedestal, the tabletop recognizes it, revealing new insights and dynamic information for the shopper. In an effort to minimize text clutter, we brought to life the idea of Semantic Zoom – a pinch-and-zoom feature for text.

Microsoft Envisioning: The Road Ahead

2011ROLE: CREATIVE DIRECTION, USER EXPERIENCE, DESIGN

Working with the Strategy and Prototyping team and Craig Mundie, the tech giant’s longtime chief research and strategy officer, I designed this interface. The working title of this Demo was “The Road Ahead”, affectionately named after the Bill Gates book of the same title - which spoke to a future profoundly changed by the arrival of a global information superhighway.

This video of Mundie presenting is a candid look at how Microsoft's leaders present these ideas as a proof-point of commitment to the future.

The Idea: In the future, we’ll have systems in place that act on our behalf to bring relevant information closer to us and make our lives richer. Additionally, we may be able to co-opt larger digital displays through our phone, freeing up the phone to be used as a ‘remote’ to control the interaction.

The Design: Based on a “bloom” metaphor, the interface is anchored by a “Now State”, located in the middle. In this instance, the protagonist is at a Tech Summit. Other elements such as Work (green), Social (blue), and Goals (yellow) surround the Now State in descending order of relevancy.

Microsoft Envisioning: Kitchen

2013ROLE: CREATIVE DIRECTION, USER EXPERIENCE, DESIGN

An informative yet simple UX system and a visually engaging, information-rich data visualization to deliver a demo that presents a futuristic approach to making dinner. I led the Karass team and worked with the Envisioning team at Microsoft to breathe life into the interactive video wall and projection-friendly countertop and stovetop visualizations.

Microsoft Envisioning - MetaData

2014ROLE: CREATIVE DIRECTION, USER EXPERIENCE, DESIGN

You guessed it! Another project with the Strategy and Prototyping team and Craig Mundie. This demo focuses on how our personal data could be used, and protected, in the future. While it’s no secret that our information is everywhere, it should be up to us to dictate how and when it is used.

Designed to be presented intimately on a tablet (by Mundie) one-on-one to policy-makers, I helped craft the concept from storyboard to final designs. The viewer is guided through a Day-In-The-Life of a business trip. At every step along the way – booking the trip, renting a car, checking into the hotel, etc. – the viewer is shown a glimpse into how the use of our personal data should be shared and controlled.

IME

An animated alphabet, tailor-made for a transformational brand. IME (Interactive Media & Entertainment Law), legal consultants in the New Media world of Virtual Reality and esports, needed a brand that looked to the future. In creating a unique logo built on a custom made “alphabet”, the team at Karass used these building blocks to design an entire visual system that is both modular and extendable. The system literally shape-shifts on the website while being static in the email block, letterhead, business cards, and social media content. Each time a user clicks on a new area of practice, the text is playfully reconstructed on the new page from pieces from the previous page. Simultaneously, the main logo fluidly morphs from icon to icon with each transition.

Amazon Research Days

As the Research division of Amazon continues to grow, community outreach is becoming more invaluable. I worked with them to create the brand, website, and collateral for their six-city/six-night event(s).

Seattle Symphony

2016ROLE: CREATIVE DIRECTION, DESIGN, WRITING

To promote selected upcoming concerts, the Seattle Symphony enlists Karass to create fun, insightful videos. Each animated piece illuminates a specific composition from a performance, revealing a unique fact about the composer and their creative process. I wrote the scripts, directed voiceovers, designed the keyframes, then handed the animation keys to Nick Penney to bring this imaginative collection to life.

Ketchikan Story Project

A series of six Emmy award-winning documentaries tell the story of Ketchikan, Alaska. Karass built a system to enhance these video stories and engage the user by adding access to archival photographs from the local museums, articles from history books, stories from the locals, and hours of additional footage of the region.

We built a custom media player that provides smooth transitions between the film and supplemental materials. Each image or text is embedded as a “beat” — a media packet that is attached to a timestamp. While viewing the film, users receive non-invasive snippets of beats, which invite them to dive deeper into the current topic. They also have the ability to read these beats as a full article and use them as a table-of-contents to navigate through the video footage.

The Ketchikan story experience is also deployed as a mobile app and to a series of kiosks around the city. For the best ease of administration, these all share a common, custom CMS and video hosting solution — a change in one affects all the others.

I created the brand’s visual identity and led the team at Karass to create the website - built on a lightweight, custom framework.

Bob at Karass created a unique system for managing the site’s content using the Google Sheets API. With nothing more than a simple, familiar spreadsheet the client can make updates on the fly.

FACEt

2014ROLE: CREATIVE DIRECTION, USER EXPERIENCE, DESIGN

The Karass office is a shape-shifting office, and sometimes our guests are part of the show. Integrating with the house band, we created a dynamic visual accompaniment. Guests would arrive and be ushered to a makeshift photo booth, where a simple GoPro took their 10 Frame ‘animated gif’. A custom-built utility hijacks the camera’s IP address, processes the data, and sends the animated portrait to a hidden projector to be displayed on the windows behind the band for all to see.

The best part: The portraits are processed into four zones, and the program “remixes” the party-goers.

The second best part: The film we used on the windows allowed people on the outside of our office to see FACETs as well.

Sandbox Esports

2017ROLE: CREATIVE DIRECTION, DESIGN

Based in Southern California, Sandbox is a training facility that focuses on the development of esports athletes. Just like any modern professional athlete, quality training is an essential part of success. A training regimen that is designed specifically for esports athletes focuses on hand/eye coordination, a strong core, fine-motor, and other elements that will help them on the digital battlefield.

The phrase ‘sandbox’ has deep roots in the video game industry, referring to the game mode/style where the user is free and in control of their environment. I designed the logo to reflect that, while incorporating the arrows to lend an aggressive, purposeful aesthetic.

Atlas Glass

A little campaign to help Atlas Glass, a startup curbside glass recycling service in Kansas City. I mean, if you believe in reincarnation...

The Robot

ROLE: PROGENITOR

Sometimes you have to make a talking robot. I’d always drawn robots, and when I had the right friends to collaborate with, the three of us made a remotely-operated, remotely-voiced, talking robot.

In 2011, The Robot took to the park outside the Karass office for ¡RobotLive!, an artistic interaction with the public during ArtWalk. From our vantage point, we could be the voice of The Robot from afar, as unassuming art-goers attempted to help complete a portrait of the heckling piece of metal. He’s seen an advancement of technology since this video was created, but the laughs are still legendary.

Windermere

2016ROLE: CREATIVE DIRECTION, VIDEO DIRECTION/CO-EDITING

Windermere Real Estate asked Karass to create a series of videos to usher in their new luxury division, The W Collection. I conducted the interviews, art directed, and co-edited each video. It was hard not to get a great shot with Patrick Kehoe behind the lens. We started with Leigh Canlis, the VP, and went on to create videos for various realtors in the division.

Commencement Bay Cannabis

The Puyallup Tribe is a federally recognized Coast Salish Native American tribe from western Washington state. When they were giving the green light to open a retail cannabis store, they needed a brand to reflect their historical and geographical importance to the region.

A key element of the Tribe’s heritage is Commencement Bay. Beginning at the indomitable Mount Rainier, it flows within the currents of the Puyallup River and culminates with a picturesque bay. The elements of the logo reflect, literally, this timeless geographical journey.

At the top of the logo is Mount Rainier, mirrored at the bottom as the reflection in the Bay’s water. The two are joined with the meandering river. The gold “C” borrows from the region’s visual language: the formline. Formline art is a feature in the indigenous art of the Northwest Coast of North America, distinguished by the use of characteristic shapes referred to as ovoids, U forms and S forms.

Microsoft Envisioning: HouseCall

ROLE: CREATIVE DIRECTION, USER EXPERIENCE, DESIGN

Collaborating with Microsoft’s Strategic Prototyping team, led by now-retired Craig Mundie, I designed this interface. The demo we created reveals how doctors might one day access patient data, enabling deeper insight and a more holistic approach to sustainable well-being.

We defined a sophisticated visual system that dynamically organizes the hay stack of medical records into a simple array of timely needles. The interface also respects the proximity of the user – the closer the doctor is to the screen, the more granular the information becomes. Conversely, the content simplifies as they move farther away.

The idea of a patient having an avatar allowed us to provide a solution for Patient Anonymity. The technology/system, with the oversight of a trained practitioner, could read body language and provide insights without the patient being physically present or have their identity revealed.

TEDx Rainier

2012-14ROLE: CREATIVE DIRECTION, VIDEO SHOOTING/EDITING

From 2010-2013, Karass served as creative consultant for TEDxRainier (now TEDxSeattle), the Northwest affiliate of TED. Helping share ideas worth spreading, I felt a promotional video that featured a cross-city journey to Meany Hall (the venue for the talks) was the way to go. I created a spinning camera rig from a bike wheel, and my friends at an architecture firm fashioned the trademark “X”, which would become the video’s meandering protagonist.

Kaidel Sportswear

2014ROLE: CREATIVE DIRECTION, VIDEO SHOOTING/EDITING

In preparation for the 2014 Seattle Marathon, local fitness apparel startup Kaidel Sportswear wanted to quickly reach potential customers on social media through video. Budget constraints (see: startup) meant I had to get creative – and fast. I took a page out of Kubrick’s book and put to work the magically mathematical one-point perspective technique. This system allowed me to not only cover a lot of ground footage-wise, but it brought an rythmic view of Seattle’s most iconic running trails.

SGB

Schroeter, Goldmark & Bender, a Seattle law firm that fights the good fight. Starting with designing their logo and website, I write/design/creative direct their print advertising and much of their digital communications.

VitalTalk

VitalTalk is An organization committed to training clinicians on how to have difficult end of life conversations. As champions of communication skills, VitalTalk uses a combination of online resources and in-person workshops that empower doctors to be effective and empathetic communicators. I created their brand (naming, logo, photography, etc.) to embody connection, clarity, and professionalism, with largely photographic imagery that emphasizes the human element of their work.

VitalTalk’s new website was designed to solve the challenge of welcoming their diverse audiences in one cohesive environment. Clinicians looking to develop their skills can directly access a vast collection of resources. Prospective teachers can learn how to obtain specialized training while graduate teachers can explore how to train their fellow colleagues. Larger institutions can have VitalTalk set up customizable educational programs for their health care system.

Bottle Cap Portraits

I love old rusty bottle caps. I pick them up and make things with them. Sometimes they become portraits.